Microsoft on Monday unveiled the Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2, the follow-ups to its first self-produced tablets, promising significant performance and battery life boosts, as well as a bevy of new features and accessories for its second-generation slates.

The Surface 2 is the successor to the ARM-based Surface RT tablet released on Oct. 26, 2012. It has a Tegra 4 processor from Nvidia and will be made available on Oct. 22 starting at $449 for the 32GB version. A 64GB version will also be available and both flavors ship with Windows RT 8.1, Microsoft said during the official unveiling of the tablet at an event in New York City. Pre-orders for the new tablet begin Tuesday morning, the company said.

The new ARM-based tablet has 25 percent more battery life than its predecessor and is "thinner, faster, and brighter" than the original Surface RT, Panos Panay, vice president of Microsoft's Surface unit, said at Monday's event. The Surface 2's touch display also has less reflectivity than the first-generation slate and the new tablet now supports USB 3.0, he said.

The Surface 2's cameras have also been improvedthe new tablet sports a 3.5-megapixel front-facing camera and a 5-megapixel rear camera, "both capable of capturing 1080p video and featuring improved low-light performance making face-to-face conversations with your favorite people crisp and clear," Microsoft said.

Buyers of the Surface 2 will get 200GB of storage on Microsoft's SkyDrive for two years after purchase, Panay said, adding that syncing and restoring will be enabled on the new tablets via the company's flagship cloud service. The software giant is also providing a year's worth of "Best of Skype" servicefree international calling and free Wi-Fi accesswith the purchase of a Surface 2.

The new tablet comes pre-loaded with Microsoft Office 2013 RT and Outlook RT, and features "improvements in key areas such as personalization, search, multitasking, built-in apps, the Windows Store experience, and cloud connectivity," according to Microsoft.

The tablet's snap-on physical keyboard is now backlit. The new touch cover, called the Touch Cover 2, appropriately enough, is also backlit and at just 2.3 mm thick is 1 mm thinner than cover for the original Surface RT, Panay said.

Surface Pro 2
The Surface Pro 2, meanwhile, is being billed as a full-blown, workstation-quality business productsignificant because the original Surface Pro and its Surface RT cousin weren't exactly huge hits with consumers. Microsoft's new Intel-based tablet will ship with Windows 8.1 and it now has a docking station accessory that can support a 3,840-by-2,160-resolution desktop monitor.

Microsoft did not immediately reveal the date of release for the Surface Pro 2, but said it will be priced starting at $899 for the 64GB version with 128GB, 256GB, and 512GB configurations also available. The 64GB and 128GB flavors sport 4GB of RAM, while the 256GB and 512GB versions have 8GB of memory.

The Surface Pro 2 sports one of Intel's latest "Haswell" processors, a fourth-generation Core i5 chip, making it "faster than 95 percent" of all laptops on the market today, Panay said. Graphics performance has been boosted by 50 percent over the first-generation Surface Pro, the new tablet's battery life has been boosted to up to 12 hours, a 60 percent increase over the original, and the Surface Pro 2 runs cooler and quieter than its predecessor, he said.

"We pushed the battery team further [and] they made it operate cooler and quieter. Every element of the design focused on battery life," Panay said.

The new tablet gets a significant bump in battery life from its new Power Cover, which delivers a 30 percent boost on its own, he said.

The Touch Covers for both new tablets have been made significantly more sensitive, Panay noted. The original Surface RT touch cover had 80 sensors but the Touch Cover 2 has 1,092 sensors, he said.

The Surface Docking Station, which could prove key to the Surface Pro 2's adoption in the enterprise, sports three USB 2.0 ports, one USB 3.0 port, a Mini DisplayPort, Ethernet, 3.5mm audio in and out, and a power hookup. Users can dock their Surface Pro 2s without needing to remove the tablet's Power Cover, the company said.

Microsoft has also redesigned the familiar kickstand for both of its new tablets (above), which can be angled so the devices can be used more comfortably in conjunction with their snap-on physical keyboards. The kickstand now locks at two different anglesthe original angle which allows for laptop-like positioning on a table surface and a second angle which makes it easier to use while resting on a user's lap.

Other new features and accessories Microsoft is rolling out for its new tablets include improved word prediction and keyboard "blades" for things like music mixing which can be snapped onto the tablet just like the standard keyboards which come with the devices.

Microsoft is also selling a new wireless adapter for its Surface typing covers for $59.99 (available for pre-order in the U.S. and Canada on Tuesday), a new USB-based Surface car charger for $49.99 (available in early 2014), and a special edition Arc Touch Mouse for the Surface priced at $69.99 (available for pre-order in the U.S. and Canada on Tuesday).

About the Author

Damon Poeter got his start in journalism working for the English-language daily newspaper The Nation in Bangkok, Thailand. He covered everything from local news to sports and entertainment before settling on technology in the mid-2000s. Prior to joining PCMag, Damon worked at CRN and the Gilroy Dispatch. He has also written for the San Francisco Ch... See Full Bio

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